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In your paddling life, you’d meet different kinds of people with different personalities and from different backgrounds, too. Some you’d easily get along with, some you just wouldn’t. And that’s okay because, first and foremost, you joined the team to paddle and there’s a lot more reasons for you to still be able to eat, sleep, and breathe the sport of paddling.

To be truly part of the team is to play your part: to be full of hope, to be willing to learn and work hard, and, most importantly, to be kind towards your teammates. What kind of a paddler are you?

1. The Motivator

He’s the one who pushes you to do your best–to paddle harder and to train more often. While he does his best to embolden and encourage you to put more effort in learning the techniques, he shows you how it’s done and he makes sure that you dig your paddle deep with your soul and might.

2. The Whiner

This paddler does more whining rather than paddling. It can be about the training program, the new coach, or anything that’s not paddling-related even. It’s just non-stop and it drains everyone’s energy and patience. If you feel like you’re being treated unfairly by anyone from the team, try to open up a dialogue but be pleasant and treat it with utmost professionalism.

3. The Ball of Fire

He gives his all. He shows up in all scheduled practices and he performs his best. He believes that putting effort in training will make him a better paddler, a better teammate. For when the races come, he is ready and his mindset would be like: It’s just one of those regular trainings, only with Umpires and Judges.

4. The Unenthusiastic

He may show up at practices but with such low energy and the performance is half-baked. It’s better to get your focus back, re-fuel, and then go back to practice. The paddler’s power and performance, or lack of it, during the training period will determine the team’s performance on actual race days.

5. The Keeper

He values the team’s unity, in and out of the boat. He keeps them excited to go to training and he persuades teammates who have not been training to come back and paddle. He’s everyone’s friend and you want to paddle alongside him always. He’s the team’s positive energy and the watchdog of whiners.

6. The Boat Wrecker

Quite obviously, this person is unhappy, therefore he does things that demoralises a teammate or the entire team—and so the boat becomes so much heavier. Every so often, they’re the ones who’s not performing at practices and fails at fitness tests. That’s why it’s important to be goal-oriented yourself and then align it with the team’s objectives and aspirations.

Dragon Boat World Athlete, Wu Chun-Chieh, hails from Hualien, Taiwan. He’s been into canoeing and kayaking before he found his passion and love for dragon boat. This World Athlete loves to watch sports games like NBA, MLB, Canoeing, Swimming, Rowing and a lot more besides.

“Dragon Boat is a very famous sport among the Chinese.”, he said. “It’s a traditional sport that is very significant in our culture.” When Chun-Chieh was only a young boy, he had already witnessed his father racing dragon boats. Later on he learned that the races are being held as part of the Dragon Boat Festival which falls on the on the fifth day of the fifth month (5/5) of the traditional lunar calendar.

When Chun-Chieh was 14 years old, he started to train in canoeing with Mr. CaNoe, a Taiwan-based sports club. In 2011, he decided to join the dragon boat team and since he’s an experienced canoeist, it was not difficult for him to learn and master dragon boat paddling.

We asked him a few questions about his life as a dragon boater, how the Chinese-Taipei Dragon Boat Team prepares for major races and how they rose to the top.

Q: Where does the Chinese-Taipei National Team usually train? How often do you train and do you have night trainings?

A: We do our trainings at Liyu Lake. It’s in Hualien, Taiwan, where I’m from. We train ten times a week, twice a day. Training lasts for about one to two hours. It’s usually morning or afternoon as we don’t have night trainings.

Q: Is Liyu Lake a good location for the National Athletes? How do you (the athletes) travel going to the trainings? How far is it from your place?

A: It’s a good venue for training aside from the occasional motor boats circling around the lake. I always drive to go to our practices and the distance is just about 20km from my place.

Q: How does the selection process in your team happen? Do you conduct National try-outs? Are your athletes picked from the Universities or Clubs or they need to go for the open try-outs?

A: Most of our team members started in Kayaking. We don’t have any special ways in picking team members. I guess it’s safe to say that the only requirement is passion and love for the sport.

Q: What does it take to be a National Athlete?

A: Never give up and have a big goal and ambition. One needs to be very confident on training and during competition. The most important thing is to keep training and practice a lot.

Q: How long do you prepare in competing for the World Championships? What are the preparations? Do you stay in one camp?

A: Four months of preparation. Yes, we train together as a group and we try to keep fit. We stay in one camp when the intensive training season starts.

Q: How do you keep fit? Any tips in keeping a healthy and clean lifestyle?

A: Find someone who loves to exercise and just keep training with them. I try to avoid eating out so I cook for myself.

Q: Outside the dragon boating world, who is the athlete that you admire most and why?

A:Adam van Koeverden. He’s a Canadian sprint kayaker. The very first time I saw him on TV was when he became an Olympic champion. He’s the athlete I look up to and admire the most till now.